Re: Fedora.NEXT Products and the fate of Spins

On 02/01/2014 11:07 PM, Kevin Kofler wrote:
> Stephen Gallagher wrote:
>> Right now, the vision essentially looks like:
>>
>> Fedora Products: This *is* Fedora. It comes in three flavors.
>
> I don't like the hardcoded "three" there at all, because if KDE is
> to ever become a full-fledged Product (which IMHO it should have
> been from the beginning!), it will need to change (unless you're
> dropping one of your 3 sacred spins).
>
Well, I thought it was clear, since I did include the words "Right
now", but yes: I do think that other products should be both permitted
and planned. One thing I've been discussing as an option with some of
the members of the KDE SIG is to promote Fedora Scientific, based on
the present-day KDE and Scientific Spins, as a fourth Fedora Product.
I think this would be valuable as it would also act as a prototype for
what the new-product process will need to be going forward.
To address another concern you had elsewhere:
One of the stated goals of the Products is to provide a known and
reliable setup. I don't view it as reducing Freedom (or Choice)
because a clear goal of this effort is to ensure that if you don't
want this setup, you don't have to use it. You will be able to either
install one of the the Products (and later remove packages you don't
want) or you can install individual packages directly from the
netinstall.iso just as you have always done. So I really view this as
an add-on: if the *choice* a user wants to make is "I'd like someone
who knows more than I do to make the decision about what I should have
installed", that's just as valid a choice as "I want to use DNF
instead of YUM". It's just taking place at a higher level.

Very well said
and I agree. It takes a long time with some packages to
ensure that you have all the dependencies, supporting software (such as
Gschem, gnetlist, and ngspice, along with models, footprints, and
symbols) and useful utilities, such as snapshot, and Gerber viewers.
Moreover, while a user often knows what needs to be done, figuring out
which utilities work well with the application is something a new user
would not be equipped to handle.
Regards,
Les H